Voyages of Discovery - Netflix

Editor

Explorer Paul Rose takes us on a journey through the pioneering names
and events in the history of world discovery.

Type: Documentary

Languages: English

Status: Ended

Runtime: 60 minutes

Premier: 2006-11-23

Voyages of Discovery - James Cook - Netflix

Captain James Cook (7 November 1728 – 14 February 1779) was a British
explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the Royal Navy. Cook
made detailed maps of Newfoundland prior to making three voyages to the
Pacific Ocean, during which he achieved the first recorded European
contact with the eastern coastline of Australia and the Hawaiian
Islands, and the first recorded circumnavigation of New Zealand. Cook
joined the British merchant navy as a teenager and joined the Royal Navy
in 1755. He saw action in the Seven Years' War, and subsequently
surveyed and mapped much of the entrance to the Saint Lawrence River
during the siege of Quebec. This helped bring Cook to the attention of
the Admiralty and Royal Society. This notice came at a crucial moment in
both Cook's career and the direction of British overseas exploration,
and led to his commission in 1766 as commander of HM Bark Endeavour for
the first of three Pacific voyages. In three voyages Cook sailed
thousands of miles across largely uncharted areas of the globe. He
mapped lands from New Zealand to Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean in greater
detail and on a scale not previously achieved. As he progressed on his
voyages of discovery he surveyed and named features, and recorded
islands and coastlines on European maps for the first time. He displayed
a combination of seamanship, superior surveying and cartographic skills,
physical courage and an ability to lead men in adverse conditions. Cook
was attacked and killed in 1779 during his third exploratory voyage in
the Pacific while attempting to kidnap Kalaniʻōpuʻu, a Hawaiian chief,
in order to reclaim a cutter stolen from one of his ships. He left a
legacy of scientific and geographical knowledge which was to influence
his successors well into the 20th century, and numerous memorials
worldwide have been dedicated to him.

Voyages of Discovery - Third voyage (1776–79) - Netflix

By the second week of August 1778 Cook was through the Bering Strait,
sailing into the Chukchi Sea. He headed north-east up the coast of
Alaska until he was blocked by sea ice. His furthest north was 70
degrees 44 minutes. Cook then sailed west to the Siberian coast, and
then south-east down the Siberian coast back to the Bering Strait. By
early September 1778 he was back in the Bering Sea to begin the trip to
the Sandwich (Hawaiian) Islands. He became increasingly frustrated on
this voyage, and perhaps began to suffer from a stomach ailment; it has
been speculated that this led to irrational behaviour towards his crew,
such as forcing them to eat walrus meat, which they had pronounced
inedible.

On his last voyage, Cook again commanded HMS Resolution, while Captain
Charles Clerke commanded HMS Discovery. The voyage was ostensibly
planned to return the Pacific Islander, Omai to Tahiti, or so the public
were led to believe. The trip's principal goal was to locate a Northwest
Passage around the American continent. After dropping Omai at Tahiti,
Cook travelled north and in 1778 became the first European to begin
formal contact with the Hawaiian Islands. After his initial landfall in
January 1778 at Waimea harbour, Kauai, Cook named the archipelago the
“Sandwich Islands” after the fourth Earl of Sandwich—the acting First
Lord of the Admiralty. From the Sandwich Islands Cook sailed north and
then north-east to explore the west coast of North America north of the
Spanish settlements in Alta California. He made landfall on the Oregon
coast at approximately 44°30′ north latitude, naming his landing point
Cape Foulweather. Bad weather forced his ships south to about 43° north
before they could begin their exploration of the coast northward. He
unknowingly sailed past the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and soon after
entered Nootka Sound on Vancouver Island. He anchored near the First
Nations village of Yuquot. Cook's two ships remained in Nootka Sound
from 29 March to 26 April 1778, in what Cook called Ship Cove, now
Resolution Cove, at the south end of Bligh Island, about 5 miles (8 km)
east across Nootka Sound from Yuquot, lay a Nuu-chah-nulth village
(whose chief Cook did not identify but may have been Maquinna).
Relations between Cook's crew and the people of Yuquot were cordial if
sometimes strained. In trading, the people of Yuquot demanded much more
valuable items than the usual trinkets that had worked in Hawaii. Metal
objects were much desired, but the lead, pewter, and tin traded at first
soon fell into disrepute. The most valuable items which the British
received in trade were sea otter pelts. During the stay, the Yuquot
“hosts” essentially controlled the trade with the British vessels; the
natives usually visited the British vessels at Resolution Cove instead
of the British visiting the village of Yuquot at Friendly Cove. After
leaving Nootka Sound, Cook explored and mapped the coast all the way to
the Bering Strait, on the way identifying what came to be known as Cook
Inlet in Alaska. In a single visit, Cook charted the majority of the
North American north-west coastline on world maps for the first time,
determined the extent of Alaska, and closed the gaps in Russian (from
the West) and Spanish (from the South) exploratory probes of the
Northern limits of the Pacific.